Shattered dreams and Rebuilding hopes: The story of Ms. Nayana Padhi

Ms. Nayana padhi (35 yrs)and her family live in Indalkusiari village of Balipatana block of Khordha district, Odisha. Nayana lives there with her husband Suresh Panda, aged 39 yrs and son Mrutunjaya, aged 8 yrs. They have a small hut and a sewing machine as asset. Suresh works as a casual labourer. Nayana supplements the family income by doing Applique work( handicraft) and tailoring. She has also availed a loan from DSS/Rang De for the second time.

This flood has been a curse to the family as it is for the entire village. The flood water entered the village and engulfed the whole village in two days. The family moved to a nearby school, which is situated in an elevated area. Her house was submerged up to the roof for 6 days. It did not collapse due to the bamboo structure of the walls( a general DRR mechanism practised in flood prone areas). But the house requires full repairing( bamboo, mud and straw) as the walls are too week, roof is partially destroyed and the floor is totally destroyed.

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The whole family stayed in the school for 8 days and survived with dry food arranged from the locality. The boy, their son was down with fever for 4 days and has not fully recovered. The family needs food supplies for at least 15 days so that they can recover.

For the last 3 days they have come back to their dilapidated hut which needs repair and will not be ready before 15 days. They are now forced to sleep on the wet floor by putting a piece of old, torn polythene sheet. They are also living in fear of snake bites, as they have killed two snakes( Boda snake) at their house in the last 3 days. There have already been cases of snake bites in the village.

They can not resume work( tailoring and casual labour as it is not available). When asked about what they need immediately, Nayana says “ If somebody could help us out from this situation and support basic items for 2 weeks, we will be able to get back on our feet”.

This someone could be YOU.

An appeal:

“There are a number of Nayanas and their families struggling to return to normalcy. Almost every year flood comes and goes creating enormous damage to life and property as well as the agrarian livelihoods of the poor in the area. Chronic indebtedness, sale of assets and large scale migration are the ultimate results”